The lab alarm blared for the seventh time just as Lin Xia found herself dangling upside down inside the ventilation duct. Her hair clip had gotten stuck between the metal grates, giving her an excellent view of Dr. Gu Chuan’s lean waistline beneath his lab coat—along with the experimental data he was currently tampering with.

  “The telomerase activity in Sample Group Three has been artificially altered,” Gu said, fingers dancing across the keyboard. The cold glow from the screen lit his profile like a marble statue. “Care to explain, dear Assistant Lin?”

  Lin Xia’s nails dug into her palm. Three days ago, she’d secretly injected a gene catalyst into a batch of lab mice. And now this bastard had found out.

  The duct shuddered. The backup reagent box above her head started wobbling dangerously. Worst of all, a vial with a skull sticker—bright purple—was rolling straight toward Gu’s elbow.

  Her body moved before her brain caught up.

  By the time she registered what was happening, she was already diving onto the lab bench, snatching the vial just before it could make contact.

  Gu turned, and in that split second, the vial exploded into violet vapor.

  “What the hell did you touch?!” For once, his usually cool voice cracked with panic.

  Lin Xia wanted to mock him for it—but no sound came out of her mouth.

  Her vision warped. Gu’s face split into three overlapping images in the haze. The last thing she remembered was his figure lunging toward her, chanting something in Latin—

  Wait. Since when did this MIT-certified tech prodigy know magic?

  When she opened her eyes again, the world had become suspiciously… soft.

  A silver pendant dangled in front of her. Some primal instinct buried deep in her DNA urged her to swat at it.

  She reached out—with a paw.

  A paw?

  She yanked back instinctively. Her pink paw pads shimmered under the moonlight like pearls.

  “The average reflex speed of a Ragdoll cat is 0.2 seconds,” came a familiar, infuriatingly calm voice from above. “You took 0.5. Looks like human consciousness dulls feline instincts.”

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  Electricity raced down Lin Xia’s spine.

  That voice—she’d been hearing it for seven years, from lecture halls to courtroom depositions. Always smooth. Always smug.

  And now Gu Chuan was holding her up by the scruff of her neck with gloved fingers, his gray-blue eyes glinting behind gold-rimmed glasses.

  “Shall we talk now, data-fudging thief?” He waved his phone. On the screen: security cam footage of her sneaking into the gene vault last week. “Or should I just call you… 32,000?”

  That number referred to the price tag on the Bluefin tuna can she’d just kicked over. The silvery chunks—worth 5,800 yuan—were now glued to his Berluti shoes.

  Lin Xia arched her back and hissed threateningly, only to be scooped into his warm arms. The scent of cedar and something hormonal invaded her nose. To her horror, she started to purr.

  “Well, your body seems honest,” Gu murmured, scratching behind her ear with surgical precision. “Starting today, you’ll work off your debt.” He opened his phone and showed her the latest memo: Addendum to Pet Ownership Agreement.

  She swiped a paw at his throat. He caught her by the scruff like fate itself.

  A sudden click broke the moment. An electronic lock opened nearby. Only then did Lin Xia realize she was in a walk-in fridge—or rather, a high-end cryo vault filled with biochemical samples. Stacked neatly inside an Hermès-labeled safe were her supposedly “lost” experiments from last week.

  “Mrow! (I knew it was you!)” she yowled, lunging at his annoyingly handsome face—only to be burrito-wrapped in a towel mid-air.

  With all the grace of a cat loaf, Gu tucked her under his arm and started unbuttoning his shirt. “Neutering’s at 10 a.m. sharp. But first…”

  Lin Xia’s pupils shrank into vertical slits.

  The chandelier sparked violently. She sprang onto a bookshelf, knocking down The Ethics of Gene Editing, which slammed into Gu’s head with a satisfying thud.

  As he crumpled to the floor, she caught sight of the digital calendar on the wall: March 17—the exact day the lab exploded seven years ago.

  Rain tapped against the glass.

  Lin Xia pressed her paw to Gu’s carotid, amazed by how steady she felt. Moonlight slid over his shoulder, revealing a scar shaped exactly like the shard of glass she remembered from that day. A wild theory took shape in her mind—just as Gu mumbled in his sleep:

  “Don’t touch that vial… Xia Xia…”

  Thunder drowned out the rest.

  Lin Xia froze in place, tail curling instinctively around his wrist. Only now did she realize: in this seven-year cat-and-mouse game, she might have been the mouse all along.

  By the time the morning sunlight filtered through the bulletproof windows in a warm honey hue, Lin Xia was perched on top of a 7-million-yuan quantum computer. Her paw pressed against the retina scanner.

  The screen blinked a warning: [Abnormal Bioelectric Signal Detected]

  “That’s your third attempt to hack my system,” came Gu’s voice, rich with the aroma of coffee.

  He leaned against the doorframe, robe loose around his waist, fresh claw marks across his collarbone. “Curious about the bid proposal? Beg me.”

  Lin Xia’s tail fluffed like a feather duster.

  She leapt for the vents—only for the electromagnetic collar to yank her right back into his arms. Gu fingered the diamond tag on her collar and chuckled.

  “Imagine the investors’ faces when they see my ‘secret weapon,’” he murmured. “Might sign the check on the spot.”

  The sound of helicopter blades split the sky as Lin Xia was shoved into a pet carrier bedazzled with amethyst. Through the grate, she saw a massive holographic display in the banquet hall: lab mice scurrying through a maze, their pupils glowing violet—the same violet as the night she transformed.

  “Be good. Showtime,” Gu whispered, brushing her trembling whiskers. “Fetch a good price, and I’ll buy you a new scratching post.”

  As the auction hammer fell, Lin Xia finally understood the symbol on Gu’s cufflinks. It wasn’t the Gu Corporation’s logo. It was the seal of the illegal lab shut down seven years ago.

  Under the spotlight of a gold-plated birdcage, she let out the most humiliating cry of her life:

  “I OBJECT TO THIS MARRIAGE!”

  The crowd erupted. Gu Chuan’s smile bloomed in the shadows. He unbuttoned his collar, revealing fresh bite marks.

  “In my defense,” he whispered loud enough for everyone to hear, “you weren’t objecting last night.”

  Static made Lin Xia’s fur stand on end.

  In that moment, she was sure of two things:

  One, Gu Chuan had known who she was all along.

  And two—once she turned back into a human, the first thing she’d do… was either strangle him to death.

  Or kiss him until he passed out.